Comments by MPhil

Comment #138978 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 2:12 am

I hope I'm not just being pedantic, but as soon as the information that contains the qualia is removed or copied from it's original time/space location it becomes 'corrupted'. Therefore, it's original private, perhaps not ineffable, experience remains intact.

I think you cannot 'remove' the qualia, you would just have to be able to describe them as physical processes. That's inescapable if you're a materialist. The idea of having the information "corrupted" already presupposes that qualia are not physical processes or states, and thus denies materialism.

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Comment #138974 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 2:09 am

Can you imagine that what pain feels like could be communicated to someone who has never experienced it, simply by informing them of the nature of the physical processes in the brain?

I believe Dan Dennett says "yes" about this?

Yes he does (with reservations):

See this paper:

http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/RoboMaryfinal.htm

It depends what you mean by "physical". The entropy of a system is not written on the particles.

Well, yes - but entropy is described by the language of physics. And that's my point - for a materialist, whatever exist must at least in principle be completely describable by the language of physics, as this language (if complete) describes the entire material universe completely.

This also takes care of your third point:

Concepts have ontological commitments. Saying that certain aspects of the mind cannot be described by using the language of physics (non-reductive materialism) is saying that the ontological implications of the concepts we need to describe the mind completely are not completely within the ontological commitments of the language of physics.

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Comment #138970 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 2:01 am

Addendum:

And since these qualia would have to be explainable entirely in the language of physics, they are no longer private - since they could principally (if not practically) described by describing what goes on in your brain.

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Comment #138967 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 1:58 am

Isn't this impossible since no two or more qualia experiencing brains, or the like, can exist in the same space at the same time? Therefore, the qualia really is unique in that sense.

This shows that they are unique, but not that they are private and ineffable. "Private and ineffable" in this case means inaccessible from the outside - but once you are a materialist - you assume that everything that exists must be physical (that being the meaning of 'materialism') and thus principally describable by (possibly a future) physics.

So for a materialist, qualia either cannot exist or must be reducible to physical processes and/or states. If you deny this, you deny reductive materialism, and as I said, non-reductive materialism is impossible.

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Comment #138961 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 1:48 am

Now that I think of it... since you subscribe to materialism, the qualia you can assume cannot be private and ineffable, since from a hypothetical perfect knowledge of the brain (and the neural nets in AI), we could talk about the qualia as the physical processes that are these qualia.

So - that "something it is like" would also have to be identical to the physical processes...

Otherwise you'd have to say they are emergent qualities, and talk about them is not reducible to talk about the physical system. This is called "emergent materialism", and is a variety of property dualism. It is a kind of non-reductive (substance-)materialism.

But non reductive materialism has several problems. On the one hand there is the causal inefficacy of mental properties, and on the other there is the fatal flaw that materialism means that what exists is principally describable as materialistic (an analytic truth), so talk about non-materialistic things always needs to be reducible. Prof. Bernhard Lauth (a brilliant philosopher of science , ontology, epistemology who also teaches quantum informatics, quantum probabilities and quantum logic and works on neural network theory, classical and probabilistic causality theories and transtheoretic structures) has devised a formal-logical proof that non-reductive materialism is impossible.
I saw it - it's brilliant, but very complex.
He promised to put it online, but hasn't done so as of yet.

But since you renounce dualism (which would include property dualism), I guess you'd agree with the first two paragraphs - unless that is you want to come out as a property dualist :)

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Comment #138949 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 1:28 am

Maybe one day a robot will walk up to me and say "I have feelings too!". So, I am not going to limit things to just neurones.

In the near future (this century, I expect) we will build artificial minds, perhaps by simulating brains. We will then be able to see exactly what is happening when a mind thinks "I am self aware" and "I have experienced qualia (such as the color red)". That is going to be amazing, I am sure.

And what if that mind thinks like I do? That there are no qualia? What if it says "the phenomenal red is just vector coding, there are no raw feels, no ineffible, intrinsic, private qualities of experience"?

:)

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Comment #138930 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:44 am

I just don't know.

Don't worry - this has been puzzling philosophers for over 2.500 years. It's not a matter of evidence - it's a matter of perspective and 'world-view' I would say.

I've simply come down on one side since I think where there is evidence, it points to materialism - and the "property - not 'thing'"-perspective (or way of speaking) seems to fit better with materialism.

As I said, I'm taking a short break and will be back soon.

It's been wonderful - once again.

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Comment #138928 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:40 am

I wonder if the notion of feeling didn't arise with sociality. Maybe our ancestors needed some way to discuss what was going on in their heads with each other as they might derive various darwinian benefit from gaining friendship, sympathy etc from their compatriots. It may be that we didn't have things like feelings until we joined social groups.

If you look at most other social animals, wolves, elephants, dolphins and of course chimps gorillas and orangutans (but not those insensitive brutes the cats) at we see various commnications that seem very like our language of emotion. That is a leaky just so story but it points, I think to a way for the whole edifice of our emotional life to arise.
Just a thought.

And an extremely interesting thought. I will have to think about that in depth... will take some time.

For now, I need another break - some more First-Person Tactical shooter in an online multiplayer session should do :)

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Comment #138926 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:37 am

I think I will need to think a lot more for a while before I comment further.

Dito.

Discussing this reminds me of reading Godel, Escher, Bach.

So true. But it's huge fun. I find it very engaging, entertaining and enlightening. It definitely serves to make me aware of some problems, be they ontological or semantical.

It's been a pleasure, as always.

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Comment #138923 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:32 am

A statement about a system is physically effecting a system.

Do you mean "effecting" or "affecting"?

And furthermore - does information affect a system? I think it is merely a property of systems (like geometrical distribution of the particles) and their interaction. And isn't what we would call the effect of information simply the property of the interaction within and between systems?

I really do think this is just a matter of language. Both ways of speaking seem to describe the same thing, but the first has a lot more ontological baggage.

Come to think of it, I think the 'geometrical distribution' analogy is rather good. Does 'geometrical distribution' exist? Is it a thing? Or merely a property? I propose it's the latter.

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Comment #138922 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:28 am

Steve,

we surely do have a way of fervently debating where it seems we really do agree.

This indicates that either we disagree about what the ontological commitments of concepts like "qualia" are, or that we simply have a semantic problem here.

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Comment #138918 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:24 am

I fully accept what Crick says.

But it seems bizarre to me that it should be like anything to be a pack of neurons. It makes as little sense as to say that it should be like anything to be a pack of cards.

I suspect it is because information processing of certain kinds always has a feel to it.

Interesting. Qualia again... as I said, I am not sure they exist, but if they do, we can agree that they must be reducible (since you fully accept Crick's statement).

But even saying that they are merely non-physical property of the physical isn't helping - for this is called "property dualism", and has the same ontological commitments unless we see it as merely an allegorical way of speaking.

So, maybe we can agree on Crick's statement - and draw the conclusion that saying "qualia don't exist" and "qualia are identical to certain brain states and processes" actually mean the same thing?

So, maybe we should adopt a way of speaking that befits this: Qualia don't get to be called 'really existing', but 'occurring as brain states and processes'.

What do you think?

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Comment #138912 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:15 am

W is information about the state of a system. Entropy has units which involve energy. So, energy is associated with information.

Is that information, in itself, physical?

This is - essentially - again the problem of universals. Evidentally, information is a property of systems, agreed?

Now, are properties physical? If they aren't, what are they? There are basically three positions:

1)Ante rebus and in rebus universals: Properties are metaphysical entities somehow connected to (or for in rebus universal "in") the physical objects, sets or tuples of objects.

2)Conceptualism as realism and as antirealism:
Properties are abstractions of the mind. These abstractions either get to be called 'real', ie 'really in existence' which would lead to several questions: "Where?" "How connected to the physical?" etc. or they don't get to be called properly 'existing'.

3)Nominalism (several varieties): Only individual physical things properly 'exist'. See for example Trope nominalism: http://www.iep.utm.edu/u/universa.htm#SH3c

This is exactly the problem of "is information physical". And it's basically just a problem of when and how to apply the term "exists".

What else could it be? I am somewhere between Conceptualism of the anti-realist variety (meaning I would not say these things can be properly said to be existing, as I reserve that for objects. As in "Objects 'exist', while processes 'occur'") and trope nominalism.

I am not firmly on one side. The only thing I am sure of is that both in rebus and ante rebus realism are far too problematic and ludicrous.

So, I guess I would say information is a "brute fact", statements about information can be true about systems, but only the systems get to be called properly 'existing'.

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Comment #138905 by MPhil on March 5, 2008 at 12:00 am

Let me quote the eminent Francis Crick:

The Astonishing Hypothesis is that "You", your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behaviour of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules. As Lewis Carroll´s Alice might have phrased: "You´re nothing but a pack of neurons." This hypothesis is so alien to the ideas of most people today that it can truly be called astonishing.

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Comment #138901 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:53 pm

As I said, dualism is deeply entrenched in our culture, our language and thus our common sense. And even if we have consciously accepted that there is only the physical - there is still a long way to go to eradicate all the hidden elements of dualism, such as the assumption of non-reducible qualia.

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Comment #138900 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:47 pm

Zombie! :)

See above :P

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Comment #138899 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:46 pm

I disagree. It is like the issue of thermodynamics that Bonzai mentioned. There is stuff to be explained, but entirely in terms of physics. This sounds to me a bit calling a physical chemist who talks about entropy "dualist".

I don't think it is. It is just realizing that the the question is that of reduction, of finding out about (strict) identity. As Bonzai said - a mapping problem. Only that in this case we are mapping talk about mental stuff, which is allegorical unless you're a dualist to talk about physical stuff. It is an extremely hard task - but we are well on the way, as Quine (the contributer) and myself have been saying. The Scholarpedia article testifies to that.

If it is explained entirely in terms of physics - then you are agreeing with me - it would be the reduction of the mental to the physical, and thus creating the ability to translate talk about the "mental" to talk about the "physical", noting that the former is now to be seen as allegorical, the latter as literal.

I have read it (and the Chimerical Colours work of Churchland), but was not convinced.

Then the suggestion of reading "the rediscovery of light" and a few more things by Dennett and Churchland stands. Of course, maybe you will never be convinced.

But please remember: If you are agreeing that any explanation would have to be "entirely in terms of physics" (or in that case, neurophysiology, neural networks etc) - then you cannot assume the existence of a second, nonphysical realm, which asking the question "and how does this explain what it feels like" does. It implies that there is something which it is to experience certain things. If we had a complete knowledge of neurophysiology and still you think the question wouldn't be answered (because you don't accept that there is identity) - what else could there be? Only something different than the physical.

EDIT: This is true ex hypothesi.

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Comment #138891 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:33 pm

... if there actually is something it is like, that is.

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Comment #138889 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:31 pm

There is nothing wrong with explaining away a problem - if it is only a problem based on faulty concepts and/or unwarranted assumptions.

Remember vitalism?

"But why does this make things alive?"

"It doesn't - it is 'being alive'"

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Comment #138888 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:30 pm

I am not cheating, and my argument is not inadequate - as I corrected myself. There is type of physical process (or an ordered n-tuple of processes) that are uniquely identical with lightning. Your statement that my analogy shows how wrong I am is really just a cheap trick.

I am not denying that there are important questions. But your question presupposes that there is no identity. We cannot investigate nomic conenctions where there no separate things. If you think there are separate things here, then by definition, however less you care for the terms - you implicitly assume dualism.

I'm just saying that the important questions are others than you think, namely - which are the physical processes that are identical to consciousness (the mapping problem, as I already stated: the research is called "neural correlates of consciousness"), not "how does one cause the other". The mapping here is to find the proper reduction. That's the question.

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Neural_correlates_of_consciousness

But will this take us any further to explaining what the sensation of red is like?

Qualia talk - again, I recommend "Quining Qualia" by Dennett and "The rediscovery of light" and "Chimerical Colours" by Churchland.

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Comment #138880 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:14 pm

I also strongly support MaxD's comment (138873).

On a side note: I prefer talking of puzzles, not mysteries. Puzzles are solvable, mysteries are somehow "beyond reach"... at least I think it's a useful distinction.

I'll be back in 15 minutes.

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Comment #138878 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:12 pm

Of course they are not identical, you can have charge separation and discharge performed in laboratory which doesn't produce lightning and these process can also produce something else, like certain kind of chemical reactions which is not intrinsically related to lightning (i.e these reactions can be produced in other settings)

Well, maybe I was using a bad example. What I meant was - there is a type or class of physical processes that is/are uniquely identical to lightning - and then the meaningless question would be "Why does the type or class of processes that are uniquely identical to lightning produce lightning?".

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Comment #138876 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:08 pm

Steve, Bonzai,

you could just as well say that we only end up with correlation between "charge separation, leader formation and discharge" and lightning.

Bonzai, it seems like you are just presupposing that they cannot be identical, as evidenced by your usage of "produce". The theory is that the mental phenomena aren't produced by, but identical to the physical phenomena.

Otherwise you end up with dualism out of the inconceivability fallacy. If there really are two things, what would the thing in addition to the physical processes be? If it's additional to something physical, and not just identical to the processes, it would have to be something entirely different from the physical - ie a "mental substance" or "mental process", but processes take place in systems ("hardware"), so there would have to be a substance. If it's physical, the processes and states are so, too. If it isn't, they're not. -Dualism.

If you keep thinking in terms of "produces", and don't even question the underlying assumption, you are (possibly covertly) presupposing dualism, epiphenomenalism (which is also dualistic) or non-reductive materialism (which is impossible).

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Comment #138870 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 11:01 pm

The one thing we really have to be extremely careful about, because dualism is so deeply engrained in our culture, in our language and therefore in our common sense, is to really investigate whether questions make sense.

Suppose we find more neural correlates of consciousness. Would the question "Yes, but why do they produce consciousness" make sense? Would even "Why are they this and that conscious activity?" make sense?

I propose that these question would be just like asking "Yes, but why does charge separation, leader formation and discharge produce lightning" (or respectively "Why is [...] identical to lightning")

There is a spell to be broken here, to use Dennett's phrase.

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Comment #138865 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 10:52 pm

Yes I certainly do think that is an important question - it is the question why conscious experiences are identical to certain specific physical processes and not others. To answer that we will have to find out which physical processes these are (the 'neural correlates of consciousness' research)

My tentative and coarse answer would be: Because of their specific structure and the functional context in which they occur. A chemical moving in your muscle does not instantiate information in a neural network. Chemical and electrical signals in the brain do.

And we do already have some insights into this. Some experimental data: For example, a firing pattern in the back of your skull when you see something will even have about the geometrical shape of the pattern on your retina - so in this instance, the temporal and spatial pattern of the activity certainly has something to do with it.

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Comment #138859 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 10:35 pm

Addendum:
I think the version I submitted can be seen as the real "hard problem", the hard problem from the materialist standpoint.

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Comment #138857 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 10:33 pm

The question of consciousness and why patterns of activities in some nerve cells generate experiences is a profound one;

[My emphasis]

But that's the thing, isn't it? I think they do not generate consciousness (and experiences), they are identical.

I would say the most important question is "What is consciousness?". (similarly to "what is lightning" concerning the analogy above)

There aren't two things, the one generated by the other, that would imply some version of dualism or epiphenomenalism. The processes in and states of the brain are identical to what some say are generated by them. Therefore, there can be no nomic connection, because there are no two separate things.

The question is, what exactly are these processes, what is their functional structure, how does their physiological structure conform to their logical or emotive structure - how can be reduce talk about "mental things" to talk about physical things.

At least that's the question if you're not a dualist or non-reductive materialist (non-reductive materialism can be proven false btw).

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Comment #138839 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:54 pm

Addendum concerning analytical and synthetic truths:

Since lightning is uniquely identical to these processes, it is true in the strict logical sense that

"Lightning is charge separation, leader formation and discharge"

is an analytical truth.

But the fact that we learned that lightning is uniquely identical to this through empirical science shows that the "analytical a posteriory" exists. This is essentially what Saul Kripke has shown (in "Naming and Necessity")

Although, I am not sure the analytic-synthetic distinction is entirely meaningful... Quine has very forceful arguments against it.

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Comment #138836 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:42 pm

Thank you, Russell, for your reply.

Before I take my break, I'd like to answer it:

I don't think my intention was to gain an edge by name-calling. I really do think that the claim of the existence of a "hard problem" is somewhat like mysticism.

As for zombies and logical possibility, I really don't think that Zombies are possible, for the following reason:

Your argument presupposes the falsity of identity theory both of the classical kind and of the Churchland-variety, and possibly teleofunctionalism as well.

For someone like Churchland, Dennett (and me), this:

But it seems to be no more than a contingent fact about the world that these particular inputs (various brain processes, etc) do causally produce consciousness.

Is essentially identical to saying:

But it seems to be no more than a contingent fact about the world that these particular physical processes (charge separation, leader formation and discharge) do causally produce lightning.

As I am sure you know, identity theory and teleofunctionalism say that these processes do not produce consciousness, but are identical to it.

Where there are no two things, but merely one thing, there can be no variety of possible connections, and it would be an analytical truth.

From the point of view of someone like Churchland, Dennett (and me), stating that the mind is not identical, but merely the product of these processes is already somewhat mystical.

I side with eliminative materialism, or more precisely - somewhere between Dennett and Churchland, because I don't think their views are incommensurable.

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Comment #138833 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:23 pm

Okay, now I feel I've flexed my intellectual muscles enough - I need a short break, some brainless entertainment.

I think I'm going to play a few sessions of "Frontlines: Fuel of War"... be back in a short while (somewhere between half an hour and one hour I guess).

______________

EDIT:

That the function of consciousness/conceptualization is dependent on a certain arrangement and complexity of matter, and until that condition is met it cannot emerge.

Functional complexity, yes. Actually certain abilities (symbol manipulation, development, manipulation and behavioural expression of concepts etc) - which in turn require a certain functional complexity. Which of course also means that I think AI is possible, even artificial personality.

Altough, I must say I think Dennett has good point: "Artificial Intelligence" is a bad term. It is genuine intelligence we want, and I think is possible, not merely an artificial imitation.

See you later then.

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Comment #138831 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:19 pm

I understand your meaning to be, conceptualization is to our brain as gills are to a fish to breath underwater. Conceptualization is a function necessarily bourne from the formation of a brain, or at least one with the sufficient working complexity.

Add to that "and developing in the right environment" and I think you're right. But that was not the reason I mentioned it. I was saying that conceptualization is a constitutive feature of consciousness, and thus has to be present (among other things) for the thing in question to be called 'conscious'.

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Comment #138827 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:17 pm

Let's say an antique, simple lock gets assigned the number one - for the most low-level representation without behaviour governing mechanisms.

A thermostate then might get assigned level 10, as it has (for the sake of argument again) the lowest level of "sensory input plus representation plus behaviour governing mechanisms".

A single celled organism then might get level 11 (or even level 10 as well, as it basically has no more ability than a thermostate, but instead of regulating temperature, it regulates movement in a binary way: away from 'toxic' and towards nutritious)

A plant then might be level 70 or even 100, a sphex about 500-1000, a chimp probably about 1.000.000-10.000.000, and a rational human being with full linguistic ability (which as I said seems to make the most difference, as it is adding a lot of entirely new levels of complexity and abilities) might get about a trillion.

Now these numbers are just off the top of my head, but they are just meant to demonstrate what I think the evidence shows.

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Comment #138824 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:09 pm

Lorien,

while I am the first to agree with your edit, there are limits. A plant is definitely not conscious, neither is an amoeba. They are far more similar to thermostates (which also have sensory input, representation and behaviour governing mechanisms based on that input and it's inherent structure) than to people. Anything resembling what we call consciousness would have to have conceptualization - and very few species even have the potential for that. Ravens extremely rudimentary, dolphins and chimps to a higher degree, but grammatical language really seems to be the deciding factor.

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Comment #138821 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:05 pm

I'm sorry if you didn't enjoy yourself Brian - I for one found our exchange of ideas and opinions very entertaining and fulfilling.

It's always a pleasure discussing things with you.

Tschuess!

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Comment #138820 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 8:03 pm

Lorien,

while I assume you were joking, I still want to say that this idea is somewhat ludicrous. Neither locks, nor amoebae nor bacteria nor plants or even sphex have anything remotely resembling what we call consciousness. Representation is there, yes. Locks have it, amoebae have more and even behaviour governing representation, higher organisms have more, but it doesn't deserve to be called conscious without evidence for conceptualization.

Representation is how intentionality works, what we call intentionality is simply high level representation based on conceptualization (which is a specific form of synaptic-weight vector-coding representation of stimuli). But the farther down you go down in complexity of systems, the less it resembles what we call intentionality, - and consciousness, until the resemblance to what we call intentionality and consciousness gets so low that it doesn't deserve to be called that.

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Comment #138817 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:57 pm

Well, I don't know if birds are entirely unconscious. Some ravens for example show the ability for (very low level) conceptualization, or something functionally equivalent. Then of course there's dolphins and chimps... and then us. As I said, probably not an on or off thing.
Still, 'sphexishness' is always there to differing degrees,

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Comment #138814 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:54 pm

It seems quite teleological to say we evolved consciousness so that we may develop technology and artifacts.

And that's not what I said at all. Consciousness isn't an all or nothing, on or off thing. The 'complexification' of neural systems through evolution produced better fitness all the way long, and thus got selected for... until it reaches a level of meta-level feedback monitoring and manipulation that we arrive at higher and higher levels of consciousness. The higher, the better the fitness. The only unique thing about humans is that we can shape our environment to a level far far above any other species.

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Comment #138807 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:49 pm

Philosophical Zombies are a ploy, a hoax. Chalmers is a mystic concerning consciousness, as I said.

All the data suggests that the same reality can only be described by two alternatives:

-There are no zombies, it's a obscured conceptual inconsistency. If all the inner and outer behaviour is the same, you have to be conscious

or

-We are all Zombies, consciousness as envisioned by the "zombieists' does not exist. It's nothing else than being a zombie.

The views are in fact only two different ways of saying the same thing.

Really, zombies are bogus. All evidence suggests that your mind is the (function of) your brain, so the function and behaviour couldn't be the same without consciousness. Zombies are impossible.

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Comment #138805 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:45 pm

I don't think it's the product of this multi-level feedback monitoring and manipulation, rather it's the process(ing) itself.

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Comment #138802 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:43 pm

The evolutionary advantage seems to be incredible adaptability, which we have demonstrated. Through consciousness and reason, we can increase lifespan, make cultural artefacts (buildings, medical instruments, drugs etc) that can increase the fitness immensely, or even lift us above having to be fit to pass on our genes, because we have an unprecedented degree of influence on our environment, in fact, a city dweller lives in a almost completely artificial environment, which protects us from the 'forces of nature' to a very large extent. Intentional highly complex collaboration is essential for that, and that requires a highly complex language, which in turn is impossible without consciousness.

At least these are my thoughts on the matter, and I think it's a very tenable view.

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Comment #138797 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:36 pm

Lorien,

I think basically, consciousness is the stacking up of feedback monitoring and manipulation of signals and signal processing to highly complex degree.

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Comment #138791 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:32 pm

Noam Chomsky also has some interesting ideas, although some newer findings question both Chomsky's "universal grammar" idea and the grammatic-centered parts of Pinker's work. I'm not sure how accurate these findings are, however.

Anyways, I think grammar is the most interesting part of language, as the grammatic structure of our idiolect is what shows and determines what we can think.

Imagine a language without adverbs - such people could not think about qualitative or gradual modifications of actions, they could have no concept of that. Only through adverbs can we do that. Without them, you would need another verb for every different qualitative difference or degree of every action - if you do this at all. yet you could not conceive of that as being essentially the same action, only different in that way - since that is the function of adverbs.

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Comment #138789 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:29 pm

Steven Pinker is definitely a good choice, but not the only one. While I don't dispute his data, I think his interpretation is underdetermined by it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying he's wrong - simply that there are other views that fit the data.

Lorien,

It does make sense - of course the specific details of the feedback structure are again determined both by genetic coding and external stimuli.

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Comment #138785 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:27 pm

Sharon,

while I would have to search my memory and the internet to produce some interesting suggestions, I think the basic idea is again conditioning to behavioural responses.

The brain is evolved to mimic behaviour - even to empathise (mirror neurons). When language is an integral part of your stimuli, this shapes synaptic connections and weights, so that these signals get processed in a certain way. And here's where operant conditioning comes in:

Normal language learning works through reinforcement - if you produce the behaviour desired by those who condition you, you get rewarded - and you tend to adopt rewarding behaviour. So the synaptic weights and connections that increase the efficiency of your verbal behaviour (since that is what is being conditioned for) develop and get strengthened.

I have also read the story of that girl, truly tragic. Didn't read that she was 'highly intelligent' though, merely apt at certain things, while completely socially incompetent. Also, the doctor who took care of her did some things (don't remember what though) that were highly questionable.
And her linguistic abilities generally remained at a very low level - showing that the brain's plasticity is kept throughout life, but that some things have to be conditioned in early childhood for the brain to properly master them. The plasticity is highest then.

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Comment #138777 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:19 pm

Might I suggest that the brain itself, the stuff it's made of, is also it's environment just as much as the trees and the grass.

I'm not quite sure how to interpret that. If you 'simply' mean that neuronal feedback also plays a factor in the setting of weights, that's indeed true... but any other interpretation doesn't seem to make sense to me. The stuff it's made of, ie it's chemical composition isn't quire the environment. But the neural feedback definitely shapes the weights and connections, so under that reading I agree.

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Comment #138774 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:16 pm

I think the problem with a lot of religious thought is in that it creates a disfunctional feedback loop onto reality.

I pretty much agree. Religious thought hijacks standard thought functions.

Agreed. And that's just in addition to the religious beliefs coming from a not reliably truth-producing mechanism (indoctrination or non-indoctrinated delusion).

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Comment #138771 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:14 pm

Addendum to my last post:

The sensory inputs which together with our genes determine the exact structure of our brains is largely uniform and systematic. And it is furthermore not merely nonintentional - ever since civilisation and especially language arose, a large proportion of the sensory inputs that structure your brain intentionally condition for specific outcomes: You are being taught things. And even the nonintentional stimuli (as for example when you just mimic behaviour of other humans without them specifically wanting you to) conditions for things like language, reason, artistic behaviour etc.

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Comment #138762 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:07 pm

Why 'non-specifically' aren't genes and genetic code conditioned specifically by the environment in which they exist? If one says non-specifically at a certain level then isn't that implying some sort of 'ghost in the machine'?

Well, that's not what I meant.
What I meant was that the DNA by far doesn't contain enough information to code for every synapse and every synaptic weight, even if all of the genetic code was only coding for that.
The DNA codes for the ability to make synaptic connections and to weigh the synapses, but it's the environmental (the sensory) input that determines what connections are made and what their weights are.
The synapses and their weights are the structure of our brain, and thereby also the structure of our mind, since they are identical.

No magic, no ghost in the machine.

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Comment #138758 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 7:04 pm

It's just how you came by that belief and whether it's supported by chains of evidence or taken as an article of faith that matters.

That's one epistemological theory.

For the diversity of views (non of which are unproblematic), see the wonderful reader (filled with original papers by all the greats) "Knowledge: Readings in contemporary epistemology":

http://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Contemporary-Epistemology-Sven-Bernecker/dp/019875261X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1204685784&sr=8-1

I personally think that the belief must have been arrived at by a sufficiently reliable mechanism (but many things can count as that, even mechanisms we don't understand).

Furthermore, while I think that we can actually have knowledge, meaning justified true beliefs (wherein 'justified' is the concept to be specified), but we can never know that we have, ie never have second order knowledge.

The reader I linked is truly amazing.

I had read a few works of classical philosophy dealing with epistemology, but I couldn't have imagined what an immensely problematic, diverse and deep field it is, - very technical, too.

Reading that book was exhilarating and enlightening, but it did put me in my place.

You read the first paper in there and think "Yes, that sounds reasonable, a good position, seems to be true."
Then you read the second paper, criticising the first and proposing another view, and you go "Oh! He's right, the position defended by the first paper is wrong. This one looks much better."...
And it just goes on like that, and all the time you get more and more enlightened about knowledge.

Wonderful!

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Comment #138748 by MPhil on March 4, 2008 at 6:48 pm

By the way - I do wonder if David read my posts... and what a person thinks of these posts who honestly believes that an immaterial deity has moved particles (contrary to the conservation of energy) in a way so that a specific amount of currency would find its way to him.

I guess it's an entirely different world.